Information Access Team
Information Management Service
Room No: Ground Floor, Seacole Building, 2 Marsham Street, London, SW1P 4DF
Switchboard 020 7035 4848
E-mail [email address] www.homeoffice.gov.uk
Our Ref
13053
Mr John Walker
Your Ref
request-20984-
Date
17 December 2009
[email address]
Dear Mr Walker
I am writing further to my correspondence of 16 October 2009 regarding your
information request dated 14 October 2009. We are now in a position to offer a
full reply to your request and would like to apologise for the delays you have
experienced while awaiting this response.
You asked for the following information
“For each of the following acts/regulations, how many times has the Home Office
been reported to the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) for alleged
breaches of the listed acts/regulations and how many times has the Home Office
been found guilty of breaking the law?
Data Protection Act 1998 (the DPA)
Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA)
Environmental Information Regulations 2004
Privacy and Electronic Communications (EC Directive) Regulations 2003”
I am pleased to be able to disclose information relevant to your request from May
2007 onwards, when the department’s remit was altered with the creation of the
Ministry of Justice. Since May 2007 the Home Office has comprised of four
constituent parts – Home Office Headquarters (HO HQ), the United Kingdom
Border Agency (UKBA), the Identity and Passport Service (IPS) and the Criminal
Records Bureau (CRB). We hold some relevant information from before May
2007 but to search for and collate it would be likely exceed the cost limit
contained in section 12 of the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act. Further
information about this can be found in Annex A below. The response below
therefore covers all four parts of the organisation since May 2007.
The ICO initiates contact with the Home Office in relation to complaints about
WORKING TOGETHER TO PROTECT THE PUBLIC
both statutory and non-statutory issues, and therefore not all contact is made in
relation to alleged breaches of the above legislation. We hold no information
about the number of times the ICO has been contacted about compliance with
any of the above legislation, as we do not know whether the ICO contacts us
about all correspondence that it receives. However we have provided information
below about the contact that we have received from the ICO as we consider this
to be relevant to your request.
Data Protection Act 1998 (DPA)
We have records of having received 56 enquiries from the ICO regarding
compliance with the DPA. These letters generally remind the department of its
obligations under the DPA in relation to the handling of subject access requests,
and request that outstanding requests are answered without delay. None of these
letters constitute formal decisions about Home Office compliance with the DPA.
Furthermore, in January 2009 the ICO required the Home Office sign a formal
undertaking after a contractor employed by it, PA Consulting, lost a memory stick
holding personal data in August 2008. Further information on this can be found
on the ICO website at this location:
http://www.ico.gov.uk/upload/documents/library/data_protection/notices/home_off
ice_undertaking.pdf
Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA)
Since May 2007 the Home Office has records of having received 71 enquiries
from the ICO about the handling of FOI requests. We have received further
correspondence from the ICO about non-statutory issues, such as the handling of
internal review requests.
The Home Office also holds information indicating the number of times the ICO
has upheld a complaint about its compliance with the FOI Act. This information is
already readily available to you, and as such is exempt from disclosure under
Section 21 of the FOI Act. You can find this information on the ICO’s website at
this location:
http://www.ico.gov.uk/tools_and_resources/decision_notices.aspx
Environmental Information Regulations 2004 (EIR)
Privacy and Electronic Communications (EC Directive) Regulations 2003
The ICO has not contacted us in relation to either of these sets of regulations.
Therefore no complaint about our compliance with either set of regulations has
been upheld.
I hope that you find this information of interest, and would like to assure you that
you have been supplied with all relevant information that the Home Office holds.
In keeping with the spirit and effect of the Freedom of Information Act, all
information is assumed to be releasable to the public unless exempt. The
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department therefore, wil be simultaneously releasing to the public the
information you requested together with any related information that wil provide a
key to its wider context.
If you would like to discuss your request further, or refine it where the cost limit
has been applied, please do not hesitate to contact me directly. Should you be
dissatisfied with this response, details of our complaints procedure can be found
in Annex B.
Yours sincerely
Martin Riddle
Information Access Caseworker
WORKING TOGETHER TO PROTECT THE PUBLIC
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ANNEX A (to Letter)–
Further information on exemptions used
Section 12 – Cost Limit
Under section 12 of the Freedom of Information Act, the Home Office is not
obliged to comply with any information request where the prescribed costs of
supplying you with the information exceed ÂŁ600. The ÂŁ600 limit applies to all
central government departments and is based on work being carried out at a rate
of £25 per hour, which equates to 3½ days work per request. Prescribed costs
include those which cover the cost of locating and retrieving information, and
preparing the information for disclosure to you. They do not include considering
whether any information is exempt from disclosure, overheads such as heating or
lighting, or disbursements such as photocopying or postage.
Should you wish to refine your request, by concentrating on a particular piece of
legislation or shortening the time period covered by your request prior to May
2007 we wil consider it further. Bearing this in mind you may wish to note that
the Freedom of Information Act and Environmental Information Regulations have
been in force since January 2005. The Data Protection Act 1998 came into force
gradually starting in March 2000, and it was preceded by the Data Protection Act
1984. The Privacy and Electronic Communications (EC Directive) Regulations
2003 came into effect in the same year.
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ANNEX B (to Letter) – Complaints Procedure
If you are dissatisfied with this response you may request an independent
internal review of our handling of your request by submitting your complaint
within two months to the below address quoting reference 13053
:
Information Access Team
Information Management Service
Home Office
Ground Floor, Seacole Building
2 Marsham Street
London
SW1P 4DF
Email: [email address]
During the independent review the department’s handling of your information
request wil be reassessed by staff who were not involved in providing you with
this response. Should you remain dissatisfied after this internal review, you wil
have a right of complaint to the Information Commissioner as established by
section 50 of the Freedom of Information Act.
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